Chatting the news: the democratic discourse qualities of non-market and market political talk television

Stevenson Neil 2010. Chatting the news: the democratic discourse qualities of non-market and market political talk television. Journalism Studies. 11 (6), pp. 852-873. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616701003711405

TitleChatting the news: the democratic discourse qualities of non-market and market political talk television
AuthorsStevenson Neil
Abstract

A body of scholarship has begun to chart the influence of “chat” modes of news delivery on discourse quality as part of what is termed the internal fragmentation of news: the shift from monological to dialogical modes of news delivery (Ben-Porath, 2007). This article investigates the democratic costs and benefits of political discourse contained in these “political talk” news formats. It focuses on four New Zealand programmes and is structured in terms of market (commercial) and non-market (public service) performance. Discourse quality is measured quantitatively by content analysis; the results identify some important democratic trade-offs that market and non-market modes of political talk make. This paper adds to international scholarship by contributing empirical data to research investigating the democratic values of public service and commercial news content; it also enables critical engagement with the issue of the internal fragmentation of news formats by providing a more nuanced account of political talk than previous criticisms.

JournalJournalism Studies
Journal citation11 (6), pp. 852-873
ISSN1461-670X
Year2010
PublisherRoutledge
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)https://doi.org/10.1080/14616701003711405
Publication dates
Published2010

Related outputs

The production and mediatisation of political talk television in the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom
Stevenson Neil 2015. The production and mediatisation of political talk television in the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom. PhD thesis University of Westminster Faculty of Media, Arts and Design https://doi.org/10.34737/988z1

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